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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23904418">Just For a Moment</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/generalkenobi715/pseuds/generalkenobi715'>generalkenobi715</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>One Shot</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 18:14:50</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>889</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23904418</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/generalkenobi715/pseuds/generalkenobi715</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>More Obi-wan angst, but this time with babies!!</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>15</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Just For a Moment</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The closet-like room was small and unassuming - not as bright a white as the rest of the facility.  Dim, but calm.  Obi-wan sat facing the door, his head resting against the wall behind him.  His robes were torn, scorched by the fire that had rained down on him just hours ago.</p>
<p>The image was still fresh.  All of it was.  As much as he didn’t want to think about it, it was all there - the hate in Anakin’s eyes, and the pain lurking just underneath.  The flash of a saber and the vision of him falling in an instant, defeated.  The sound of his own voice, screaming in desperation, wracked with the knowledge that he couldn’t save him.  The vibrations of Anakin’s last words to him.<br/>
“I hate you.”</p>
<p>Part of him thought he had every right to.</p>
<p>He had failed him.</p>
<p>His mind jumped to a screen of glass, a clean operating table.  Padme, so characteristically strong.  The feel of her hand in his as she gave everything she had to bring her children into the world.  Anakin’s children.  The weight of the knowledge that she wanted more than anything to give them a fighting chance.<br/>
The love in her eyes as she looked up at them, and the pain which hovered underneath.  The quiet desperation in his own voice as he begged her to hold on.  The calm of her tone as she trusted Obi-wan with her last hopes - “there’s still good in him.”  Barely a whisper.  </p>
<p>The pain that pierced his chest as she died, still believing in the man she loved.<br/>
The sound of their children, made orphans in mere moments, crying in his arms.</p>
<p>They were calm now, and the warmth of the bundles under his robe brought him back to reality.  In the blur of it all, Obi-wan had scooped them up, almost without question, and brought them here, to the first quiet place he could find.  Away from the world, away from everything.</p>
<p>He couldn’t tell if he or the children were the ones that needed it most.</p>
<p>A gurgle from Leia made him lower his head, gazing down at the bundles in each arm.  It hurt to see them here, in his arms instead of his parents’, but all he could do was look at them.  Luke was nearly asleep, blue eyes floating shut.  Blue eyes Obi-wan knew all too well.<br/>
Leia’s were wide open - bright and clear.  It seemed he knew those eyes, too.  Perhaps they were the same.</p>
<p>They were beautiful.  Both of them.  Miracles in their own right.  They were incredibly small, the circumstances of their birth far more rushed than they or Padme had deserved.  But they were here, in Obi-wan’s arms -<br/>
- the only arms left, it seemed, to hold them.</p>
<p>Brow furrowing, he held them closer.  Their immediate physical similarities aside, he could think of nothing but the fact that these were Anakin’s children.  Perhaps, in some twisted way, they were the good that remained of today - the good Padme had spoken of, and the good that remained of their father.  </p>
<p>Their father, he thought painfully, that could never know of their existence.</p>
<p>All the same, these were not Vader’s children.  These were Anakin’s - the son and daughter of the boy he had trained as a son, and the man he had loved as a brother.  Though they were hours old, and in a way he could never have expected, he loved his children, too.  He had long ago come to terms with the fact that he wouldn’t be a parent, but now, this...  </p>
<p>He looked down again at the quiet faces.  Apparently the closet had done them some good, too.  They didn’t know the pain of today, and it was far better that way.  Better they didn’t know.  </p>
<p>He wished he were in their shoes.</p>
<p>More than anything, Obi-wan was hyper-aware of the sheer size of the universe.  Here he sat, cradling two tiny infants in a tiny room.  But outside, an entire galaxy waited.  A galaxy full of danger, full of pain.  Full of Vaders, and full of Palpatines.<br/>
So big, so small.</p>
<p>He ran a finger over Luke’s cheek as he slept, pushed his thumb through the wisps of dark hair that dotted Leia’s head.<br/>
They were his second chance.  He didn’t deserve it, but here they were.<br/>
The thought brought the prick of tears behind his eyes.</p>
<p>He wouldn’t fail them, too.  Not a chance.</p>
<p>But for now, he simply sat.  Just for a moment.  The galaxy was shifting, and his role was less than clear.  But just for a moment, he held the children, felt their warmth against his chest.  Life.  Precious beyond imagination.  They were there, and they were safe - with him.  In the midst of all the loss and fear and desperation and pain of today, he’d been given one - no, two reconciliations.</p>
<p>He’d lost the two people he loved most.  And for the first time, he let his tears fall in grief.  But he’d also been given a gift - the gift that should’ve been theirs, but which was a piece of them all the same.  Anakin’s daughter.  Padme’s son.  They were here, in his arms, and they were good and warm and safe.  </p>
<p>They were hope.</p>
<p>And for the first time, he let his tears fall in love.</p>
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